


chuck bass, and the people who loved him

by ivermectin



Series: he's chuck bass [1]
Category: Gossip Girl (TV 2007)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/M, M/M, POV Chuck Bass, Recreational Drug Use, Sex, Underage Drinking, Unhealthy Relationships, chuck bass typical disregard & disrespect of other people, dan gets it worse but it's just because of the POV, mentions of suicide attempt / self harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:35:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29173500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivermectin/pseuds/ivermectin
Summary: It’s true that Chuck primarily cares about money, business, and pleasure, but sometimes life gives you love, and often, it’s not the people you expect.
Relationships: Chuck Bass/Blair Waldorf, Chuck Bass/Dan Humphrey, Nate Archibald/Chuck Bass
Series: he's chuck bass [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2141673
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	chuck bass, and the people who loved him

**Author's Note:**

> you all _know_ how I feel about Chuck, I just wanted to explore writing something out of my wheelhouse. Also, if this seems to favour Chuck too much/in a way that makes you uncomfortable ( ~~me too! but I wrote it~~ ) rest assured that the second work in this series is tonally very, very different to this.

_the best friend_

Kindergarten. Nate Archibald, age six, too sincere, too genuine. Chuck wasn’t really like a child, even then, in the business suit his father had chosen for him, too stiff, all starched collar and everything. Alphabetical order based on last name. Archibald, Bass. That was all it took, for them to be friends.

And then there were parties, high society parties. And they grew up, one grade at a time. Summers spent reading comics together and playing video games and drinking soda turned into Carter Baizen teaching them how to roll joints, smuggled porno mags they’d read after dark, beers they drank just to feel like real men.

Nate was much better than Chuck at rolling joints, and they’d sit there, together, smoking up. Chuck would watch Nate’s deliberation, the way he was so contained and wound so uptight. When he got together with Blair, Chuck thought, _matched set, you’re both so fucking full of it, fucking full of pretending._

And when Chuck kissed Nate, somewhere between age thirteen and fourteen, and Nate actually kissed back, Chuck knew he’d hit gold.

_the best friend’s girlfriend_

They’ve broken up now, Blair tells him when he asks about Nate. She’s at the club, she tells him Nate’s not coming. They sit together, sharing drinks. Blair’s checking the girls out, acting as if Vitrola belongs to her, and not to him, Chuck thinks. It pisses him off a little less than it should. Instead of wanting to hire a hitman, he just really wants to fuck her.

She’s an enigma, complicated and multi-layered. She doesn’t get enough credit for being so many things, so many different girls at once.

“I’ve got moves,” she insists, and he goads her, just for laughs, because why the fuck not. But then she’s handing him her drink, and she’s going on stage, throwing off her dress, fancy couture green lace her mother probably selected for her, standing there in a silk slip with pearls on, laughing gleefully.

He thinks he’s finally met his match. He raises his glass.

He has no idea who this girl is. Yes, she’s Blair Waldorf. But he doesn’t know who she is.

_some random_

When Dan Humphrey comes to him, saying he wants to be taken out of his comfort zone, Chuck takes him at his word. And then, just takes _him_ , in the limo. What? It’s a classic.

They have two wild days, Humphrey’s gullible naïveté amusing to Chuck in a way that few things are. Chuck leaves him with hickeys and no shoes, and Humphrey just walks home. Chuck leaves one of his scarves in Humphrey’s satchel at school, just to fuck with him.

It’s fun. It’s interesting. It’s scary, how this boy with a too-intent expression and something about him that Chuck just cannot parse, is here, and it’s throwing Chuck off his game. They’re in jail together, and Humphrey’s expression of shock is all it takes. Chuck is on his knees, hands slamming Humphrey’s hips against the wall, swallowing him down expertly.

“Chuck, we’re in _jail_ ,” Humphrey says, but his hands are making fists, and the vein in his neck is prominent like an overgrown tree root. “You can’t do this here.”

Chuck doesn’t say anything, he just looks up, meeting Humphrey’s gaze.

When Dan Humphrey turns out to just be in it for a story, Chuck Bass is relieved. He doesn’t know what those days were; all he knows is that he’d lost control in a way that very few people have managed to get him to lose control.

He’s relieved. He doesn’t think about Humphrey at all. Well, at least, not until the Yale visit, which backfires on him. Nate condemns him for his actions, befriends Humphrey, but Chuck _knows_ Nate, and he _knows_ Dan. Friendship, his ass. Those two will be fucking within the week.

Nate Archibald, Chuck’s first love. Throwing him away for Dan Fucking Nobody.

_his girlfriend (yes, the best friend’s girlfriend, but it’s different now)_

Blair is his girlfriend.

It takes all of senior year, a back and forth, pushing each other’s boundaries, but when his dad dies, she’s there for him anyway, holding him, pulling him back from the ledge when he contemplates suicide.

She is his girlfriend. He gives her gifts from Paris, tells her he loves her, and she laughs, delighted. His wonderful, fucked-up, sinister, evil, powerful girlfriend. They’ll make business magazine covers. They’ll be remembered.

Or so he thinks. He thinks he can have both, and then he has to choose between his business and the woman he loves. The woman he loves will always choose him, he thinks, so he chooses his business over her.

This time when she breaks up with him, he thinks it’s for good.

_some random (again)_

Dan Humphrey is a nobody. When Nate chooses Dan over Chuck, Chuck wants to stab something (preferably Dan Humphrey.) When Blair does it too, choosing _Humdrum Humphrey_ , it’s salt in an open wound. But then, things go the way he always knew they would. Blair will not break off her engagement, and as it gets closer and closer to the wedding, Chuck finds himself spending more and more time with Dan.

Dan, who cares about how Chuck feels, about the numbness and the self-harm. Dan, who gets him a dog in an attempt to make him feel better. Who sits next to him on the sofa and gets them both snacks and puts movies in for them to watch and tries his best to _fix_ Chuck.

Chuck has always wanted someone’s devotion. Humphrey’s the wrong fucking person, but he’s there, so Chuck does what he always does. Puts his hands on Dan’s jaw, licks his neck, opens his shirt, gets a hand into his pants. Has Dan writhing against him, has Dan come with Chuck’s name in his mouth. Again.

But this time it becomes a pattern. Like a liminal space, something to do to distract from the Blair-shaped ache in their hearts. But this time, sometimes, Chuck catches Dan looking at him, and he thinks maybe, just maybe, Dan Humphrey is in love with him.

Dan’s fatal flaw, after all: falling in love with people who are visibly ruined, who are openly damaged. Who is more fucked up than Chuck Bass? Nobody. And Dan Humphrey is a fucking mechanic. The worse a person gets, the more in deep he gets, too.

It doesn’t mean anything to Chuck. It’s nice to have a warm body to fuck. That’s it.

_his ex-girlfriend_

She’s there, a vision in orange. His woman, his Blair. She’s putting all her chips on the table.

“This time, I’m all in,” she says. There’s something unreadable in her eyes.

He wonders what made her choose to ditch Humphrey. He doesn’t ask.

The natural order has been restored, after all. Here they are: Chuck and Blair, Blair and Chuck.

 _There’s nothing I can’t do with you by my side_ , he thinks. It’s not a sweet sentiment. It’s bitter, leering, a little annoyed. He’s Chuck Bass; he doesn’t appreciate being thrown away without a second thought.

He looks at her. _I need to be sure you won’t leave_ , he thinks. Somewhere, angry and crooked, he thinks, _I won’t let you._

Every man needs insurance, needs a back-up plan.

Chuck nods at Blair. She nods back.

All things in their place, as they should be. The winner takes it all, and the winner was never going to be someone as insignificant as Dan Humphrey. There is a status quo for a reason. He knows who he is. Chuck Bass wins, every time. No matter what it takes, no matter what the stakes are.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm uploading part 2 RIGHT now.


End file.
